


How Not to Bake a Cake, by Joe Jones

by Kyra_Bane



Series: 30 Day OTP Challenge [6]
Category: The Old Guard (Movie 2020)
Genre: Birthday, Birthday Cake, Cute, Domestic Fluff, Fluff, Immortal family, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-09-03
Updated: 2020-09-03
Packaged: 2021-03-06 22:01:06
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 972
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26276065
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Kyra_Bane/pseuds/Kyra_Bane
Summary: Joe attempts to make a cake for Nile's first birthday after joining them. It goes terribly (wonderfully) wrong.
Relationships: Joe | Yusuf Al-Kaysani/Nicky | Nicolò di Genova
Series: 30 Day OTP Challenge [6]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1894534
Comments: 27
Kudos: 206





	How Not to Bake a Cake, by Joe Jones

**Author's Note:**

> so the prompt on this one (for the otp challenge) was: making fun of one another which, while i 1000% believe joe and nicky do, developed into this thing. let's face it, the family is the one true otp.

It's not that Joe can't cook.

Joe is, in fact, a very good cook. 

So long as it's one of the handful of recipes he knows, of course. 

Somehow, a chocolate cake is not one of them.

He eyes it critically, pursing his lips. He had to cut some off the bottom half, which had started to burn — and so he'd taken the top half out a little early and, while it's cooked, it has kind of... sunken in on itself.

Joe lets out a sigh and looks at the bowl of icing. Nile and Andy are out because Joe asked Andy to take her out, right after Nile had started getting quiet and listening to her music more, right after he and Nicky had looked up her obituary and found out...

It's her birthday. Today. Joe isn't sure she'll want to celebrate, as such, but he gets the feeling she used to celebrate the occasion with her family. They're not going to replace her family but he wants her to feel welcome. 

So he's made a cake. Is making a cake. Or something similar, maybe.

Warm arms wrap around his waist and Nicky rests his head on Joe's shoulder. Joe closes his eyes for a moment. It's more so that he doesn't have to look at the cake.

Nicky's chuckle rumbles against his back. "What happened, cuore mio?" 

"I, uh... I think I went wrong, somewhere." The recipe is up on a laptop, which is covered in flour and butter and Joe doesn't want to think what else. His cake looks nothing like the image on the nice lady's blog. He thinks maybe there was a secret to the recipe, somewhere where she'd been talking about the first time she'd introduced her children to the wonders of Belgian chocolate, but he hadn't really been reading that part.

Nicky lets go of him, reaching around to snag some crumbs. He chews thoughtfully and shrugs. "It tastes okay."

 _Okay_ is not quite what Joe's after. He frowns. 

"When will they be back?"

"Uh, soon, I think. Nile wanted to have lunch here, so. Soon."

"Okay, then we will frost it and present it and I am sure Nile will love it regardless."

Joe nods silently because he's a little frustrated he hasn't managed to do this on his own and he's also annoyed at himself for not asking Nicky for help earlier. Nicky squeezes his shoulder like he knows just what Joe is thinking and then they get to work.

Nicky is not much of a baker, either, but he has a knack with food that means the cake comes out looking presentable, Joe thinks. They leave it on the side and tidy up, finishing just as Andy and Nile come back through the door.

Andy has made Nile walk ahead of her, has her hands over Nile's eyes. Nicky snorts and lights the candle — just one because they'd all forgotten to get those and they'd found it rattling around in a drawer, though Joe isn't sure why — and when Andy lets Nile go, Nile's eyes immediately fill with tears.

"You all, you—" she says and then she's wiping at her face, isn't sure where to look. 

"Joe made it," Nicky says and Nile looks up at him, for a moment entirely speechless.

"Joe, thank you," she says. She launches herself at him, burying her face in his chest and he holds her tight, running a hand up and down her back as her shoulders shake. Andy sits down on one of the stools at the counter, running a finger through some of the icing that's on the plate. She licks her finger and pulls a face. Behind him, Nicky laughs.

Nile lifts her head, smiling at Joe before she wipes at her eyes again. She blows out the candle, closing her eyes as she does, but when she opens them, she's looking at Andy.

"What is it?"

How she's come to read their boss in such a short time is something Joe doesn't understand, but he's glad of it. 

"You, uh, might want to taste the icing before you eat any of that."

Nile reaches out, just where Andy did, and licks the icing she picks up off her finger. She pulls the same face Andy made but then looks at Joe guiltily. "It's good," she says and Joe can't help his laugh.

"You are a bad liar, Nile," Nicky says from behind him. He also tries some of the icing and then he's laughing so hard against the back of Joe's neck that he's practically wheezing.

"What?" Joe asks. "What is it?" 

"You know how sugar is made up of those tiny white crystals?" Andy asks.

"Yes?"

"Yeah, turns out so's salt."

Joe looks at her, then at Nile, then turns around to look at Nicky.

"Did you _know?"_

Nicky pulls his guilty face. "I'm sorry, habibi," he says. "But we didn't have time to get everything done and make more. Especially since you didn't just put salt in the frosting."

Joe can't help it: he starts laughing. It takes a second for the others to catch on, but then they're all laughing — because it's ridiculous, of course it is, but something warms in his chest when he realises this will probably be the memory Nile has of her first birthday after her first death; a perfect cake would never have done that.

"We walked past a cute bakery in the village," Andy says when they're done, when Nile is wiping tears of laughter from her face and Joe is leaning back against Nicky. "Let's go get something from there."

Nile nods, the smile blooming across her face wide and real and when she grabs Joe's arm, drags him out with her, he knows the cake was more than worth it.

**Author's Note:**

> kudos/comments = love, no seriously i cherish every last one 🖤


End file.
